
Qass. 



Book .ill- 



I 




ABEAM LINCOLN 



AXD 



SOUTH CAROLINA. 



BY J. -^YAGKER JERMON, ESQ. 



^ 



./ 




PHILADELPHIA : 

D. E.Thompson, Printer, S.W. cor. Seventh and Market Sts. 



186L 



ABRAM LINCOLN 



AND 



SOUTH CAEOLIM. 



The period bas now arrived when it beliooves every honest 
man and American citizen to examine carefully and thoughtfully 
the present condition of our distracted country. The black 
cloud of Disunion now hangs like a pall, above us, and threatens 
with annihilation our whole social, moral, and political horizon. 
For eighty-four years our noble republic has lived amidst the 
storms and tempests that have shaken Europe to its centre, ex- 
hibiting to the admiring gaze of the whole world, an unexampled 
instance of prosperity. The question now is, shall this glorious 
fabric of our Union, erected by those staunch patriots whose 
names our infant tongues were learned to lisp, be ruthlessly torn 
asunder, state by state, until the falling timbers become the prey 
of the traitors false alike to their country and their God ? Or, 
shall we come to the rescue, in our patriot strength, hand in 
hand, and stand firm upon our constitution, determined that we 
loill thwart the few treasonable plotters who are now striving 
to tear it asunder. True, our present efforts are well nigh para- 
lysed ; for never since the first day of our existence as a Union, have 



we had an imbecile president, like the present incumbent — James 
Buchanan. Since the day of his inauguration, his whole course 
has been marked by fraud and the basest political chicanery. 
lie has violated his oath of office, in which he swore to preserve 
inviolate the constitution and the Union. He has proved false 
to his own political friends. He has bestowed office upon the 
veriest tricksters. He has called into his private cabinet men 
who were utterly incompetent, and who, had they been, compe- 
tent, lacked the moral honesty to carry out the duties assigned 
them. 

The whole country has been greatly mismanaged by him. 
That James Buchanan has allowed the government funds to 
be used for party purposes and political capital, no one will 
deny. My fellow-citizens, then why should our Southern breth- 
ren entertain so much fear, and dread the period when the in- 
coming President shall take the reins of government. Can it 
be possible that he or any other living being can possess less 
honesty, less virtue, less moral courage and less love of country, 
than the present incumbent ? I fear not. 

The time was in our history that the nations of Europe en- 
vied our happy and prosperous condition; but, alas! that 
period has well nigh passed. In the last four years extravagance 
has marked the conduct of the present administration in every 
act, and our public treasury lias been robbed and plundered un- 
der the eye of the President with impunity. Bribery has been 
allowed to go on in the very halls of our national legislature, in 
our custom-houses, and in our navy-yards. Is this doubted ? 
Look at the evidence disclosed before the " Covode Committee.'' 



It charges that large sums of money have been extracted under 
the knowledge and sanction of the present administration. 

Had the President been impeached, as he doubtless should 
have been, he would have been hurled into the retirement of pri- 
vate life under the execn'ations of an indignant people. Under 
his theory of '■'pop^^^'^^ sovereignty," the public funds have been 
expended to force upon a free people a form of government con- 
trary to their rights, and in direct opposition to the constitution 
of the United States, and in violation of his oath of ofiEice in 
which he was sworn to protect, defend and execute the laws of 
his country in accordance with the constitution of the Union. 
If this be "popular sovereignty," God help the people of this 
or any other country where such a sovereignty may exist. It 
may be James Buchanan's theory, but it certainly is not republi- 
can principles, such as was taught us by our noble Washington. 

Yes, fellow-citizens, he has done more than this. Whilst 
he has acknowledged, in his last official message to Congress, 
that he was vested with authority to execute the federal laws, 
and crush the arm of treason ; and that he would, at all hazards, 
preserve the public property in the South, he has lacked the 
courage to exercise that authority and enforce the constitution. 
Within the last fortnight, he has quietly looked on and seen our 
flag torn from the public buildings in Charleston ; the custom- 
house, post-office and forts, forcibly taken possession of by a 
few of the outlaws of South Carolina. And when entreated by 
the gallant Major Anderson, in command of Fort Moultrie, to 
send a reinforcement to his aid, he serenely remarked that 
he did not wish to do any act that would inflame the people 



6 

of that state. He was appealed to by the noble wife of that 
officer, in pathetic language, to save her husband and his gallant 
little band, from the destruction that hourly threatened them. 
General Scott, the hero of a thousand battles, appealed to him, 
for days, in vain, upon the propriety and absolute necessity of 
sending military aid to Fort Moultrie. 

But all these appeals were listened to with a deaf ear by 
Buchanan, and had it not been for the manly courage and daring 
bravery of Major Anderson, Fort Sumpter would have been 
ere now in the hands of the rabble. For such noble conduct 
on the part of the latter, his name will be a sacred theme for 
the pen of the historian, when that of James Buchanan shall re- 
ceive the execration which it so richly merits. Look at the 
stupendous frauds that have been practiced during his adminis- 
tration ! I shall not pretend to enumerate them, for the press 
contains ample accounts, open to the perusal of all. Within the 
last few days the sum of eight hundred and seventy thousand 
dollars of Indian trust funds was embezzled by Secretary Floyd 
and his assistants, Bailey and Russel, under the immediate con- 
trol and eye of the President, for the purpose of furnishing fire- 
arms to the South. He has also allowed large quantities of 
arms, stacked in the N'orth, to be removed to the South, well 
knowing that they would be used for treasonable purposes ; yet, 
this same provident and conscientious President, pretended to 
be afraid of sending a small reinforcement to Fort Moultrie, 
le^ by so doing, he would fan the flame of secession. 

In viewing the conduct of James Buchanan during the last 
few weeks, my heart well nigh fails me. Surely now is the time 



for every honest man, if he possess one spark of patriotism, to 
stand firm upon the constitution as the rock of his safety. What 
the present excitement may lead to, no man can tell. The sev- 
erance of one link that binds the Union together, would be, in 
itself, insignificant ; but when we reflect that other links may be 
destroyed, and that thus the whole chain that binds our glorious 
confederacy may be broken ; it not only becomes us to pause, 
but to be moved, in the language of the illustrious "Webster^ 
to ''action, action, action.''' If there was ever a time for unity 
of government it is now. In the language of the Father of his 
Country, "the unity of government which constitutes us one 
people, is also dear to every man. It is justly so ; for it is the 
main pillar in the edifice of our real independence — ^the support 
of our tranquility at home, our peace abroad, of our safety, our 
prosperity, and of that liberty which we so highly prize." 

If the Xorth has violated the laws of the South in depriving 
them of their property, the constitution affords them ample 
redress. If any northern state has upon its statute book, any 
unconstitutional law which conflicts with their laws and interests, 
the federal courts are open to give them the fullest indemnity for 
any and every wrong. If any northern state refuses to recog- 
nize the fugitive slave law, the federal authorities have the power 
to enforce it. Then, if this be so, what cause have the South to 
complain of the North ? In most of the cities north of Mason 
and Dixon's line, the citizens have met in mass, and passed resolu- 
tions showing their earnest determination to repeal any and all 
laws upon their statutes, conflicting with the constitution or 
the rights of the South. Conoress has submitted the question 



8 

of tlieir alleged grievances to a committee cliosen from all the 
states, for the purpose of bringing about a reconciliation. This 
offer upon the part of the North has been spurned with contempt 
by the South ; in fact every conciliatory measure has been tendered 
to the latter with the same result. They have been called upon 
again and again to state their grievances, in order that we might 
be informed as to what rights she desired, but the only response 
has been — "the day of compromise is forever passed," and that 
they were determined upon secession. In fact the South have 
boldly admitted that they wanted no indemnity for the past, but 
for the future. They say that we have elected Abram Lincoln, 
a black republican or rabid abolitionist, and that, under his 
administration, their rights will be unprotected. 

This must be wholly imaginary on their part, because the 
principles of Lincoln are identical with those of Jefferson, Mad- 
ison, Monroe, John Quincy Adams and George Washington. 
That he is a repuljlican in principle is true ; but I deny that he is 
an abolitionist. He claims that slavery should not be extended, 
but that it should be protected as a peculiar institution of 
the South, where it now exists. I cannot believe the declaration 
of the South in stating that their rights will be ignored under 
the administration of Mr. Lincoln. On the contrary, they have 
been solemnly assured by an exposition of his principles, made 
by him whilst in Congress, in 1848, and throughout his entire 
political life, that a just enforcement of the constitutional rights 
should be maintained, both Xorth and South, at all hazards and in 
defiance of all opposition. They have also assigned, as another 
reason, that Abram Lincoln was unfit to occupy the presiden- 



9 

tial chair ; that he is no statesman, totally without experience, 
and a man of limited education. That when the North nomina- 
ted him they meant a gross insult to the South. These are a 
few of the many declarations I heard freely expressed during a 
recent tour through most of the southern states. It is true that 
Abram Lincoln, like many of America's greatest sons, was 
reared in the days when the facilities for education were vastly 
inferior to those we now enjoy. His life it may well be said 
furnishes a history of rare mental endowments. It tells what 
labor may surmount — "the steep where fame's proud temple shines 
afar ;" how, in early life, the obstructions of inauspicious poverty 
may be encountered and vanquished ; how, as the young aspirant 
moves onward, his hopes may be elevated to cheer his toil ; how 
height after height may be attained and progressive victories 
won ; how the misgivings that so commonly cloud the spirits and 
darken the path of the young, gradually break away before the 
march of sturdy industry ; and how gratefully these better pros- 
pects reward the perseverance by which the goal is reached. It 
shows, in the language of a great statesman, what " midnight 
labor and holy emulation" may achieve. It tells us that those 
who earnestly pursue these noble aims shall find their just re- 
ward in the energy and fervor of their own minds ; above all, 
it tells how unerringly faith and honor and truth commend their 
votaries to the applause of the good ; what suffrages they collect 
from the esteem of mankind ; what bland and mellow rays of con- 
tentment they shed upon the heart, and how they smootli the 
pathway from infancy to inanhood, and from manhood to tlie 
grave. 



10 

Abram Lincoln, it may be said without derogation, was of 
lowly parentage, and at au early age, left au orphan upon the 
cold charities of the world. His was a scanty patrimony, with- 
out even au ordinary education or a penny iu his pocket. He 
w^as left to stem the ills of life in our, then, wilds of the north- 
western territories. Even in infancy he was a subject of 
remark amongst those who knew him, and doubtless he then im- 
bibed something of that peculiar tone and feeling which belonged 
to the plain-living and high-thinking men of other days. 

A familiar conversancy with the great principles of human 
liberty, a stern and uncompromising love of country that did not 
spend itself in profession, for it broke forth in daily action ; 
frugal habits, ignorance of luxury, and contempt for frivolous 
manners, little application to the arts of growing rich, and long- 
commingling in public affairs, brave submission to misfortune, 
patience in privations, and a quick sense of national wrong — 
are the distinguishing traits of his manhood. 

Ifc is pleasant to look back to the early life of men who have 
ai'rived at great eminence, that we may endeavor to discern the 
first faint flickering of that light which has shed in later years, 
such a glad effulgence, and that we may contrast the germs of 
power in the infant, with their subsequent development. There 
is a charm in their days of childhood which marks them as sub- 
jects for pleasurable contemplation. Their unheeded ramblings, 
their thoughtless jollity, their innocence — invest them with a 
poetical freshness to the musings of manhood. They have the 
verdure of the spring, and resemble the smooth surface of the 
meadow, where every l)lade of verdure, and useful plant, and 



11 

every noxious weed shoots up with the same tenderness of fibre, 
the same hue — and all look fresh and beautiful. The growth of 
riper seasons distinguishes the good and bad, the useful from the 
worthless, and furnishes that wide variety of character perceptible 
to the most careless gazer. 

I can fancy Abram Lincoln, when a poor orphan boy, in 
the days before steamers floated across our western lakes, making 
his way upon a flatboat, heavily laden with the products of the 
West, down the majestic father of waters to Xew Orleans. 
Upon that glittering stream, like a broad lake, did he see the 
sylvan pictures of " the land with woody hill, o'er hill encompassed 
around." There too, he discerned afar off, the western hills, 
showing their bold crags through which the river had shot its 
way to meet the tide. From this same point he might look 
down upon a level plain, where, for many a rood, there lay 
beneath his eye varied and picturesque landscapes ; and far 
across until it terminated on the margin of the wide waters 
beyond. This plain, more beautiful from the contrast with the 
environing hills, that, in gentle slopes or sudden crags, begirt its 
borders, itself presented a scene to catch the delighted eye of the 
orphan. 

The lowing herds that trooped across these plains ; the wind- 
ing stream that meandered through its coverts ; the slow team 
that laboriously made its way through the scanty harvest field ; 
the long shadows thrown athwart the verdant meadow ; the cir- 
cling nighthawk that darted in swift evolutions in quest of prey ; 
and far along its western confine, the burnished gold of sunset, 
illumining the river with tints more lovely than the poet's en- 



12 

cliantment, flings around " the realms of fancy ;" — all tliese 
images tlien rose on the young observer's eye, with a witchery 
that every added year in the progress to manhood robbed of some 
of its potency. How little did he imagine, that in that sculptured 
capitol he, himself, the forest wood-chopper, with no higher 
thought than to toil with his rude axe, should, in the pride of his 
manhood, be clothed in the highest function in the gift of his 
countrymen ; to which, eminent as it might be, his then unknown 
genius should impart its highest dignity. 

The case of Mr. Lincoln is peculiarly strange, as if propitious 
Destiny herself had chosen him to carve his way amid the many 
vicissitudes of fortune up the rugged hill of his country's fame. 
In his case the reader has a lesson which teaches what a man 
may do by honest toil and virtuous ambition. It teaches that 
fortune benumbs the faculties of the young with that most mis- 
chievous of diseases — indolence, and leaves the canker of idleness 
to eat into the mind just at a period when education should be 
busy to strengthen it for future toils. The day of self-dependence 
with Mr. Lincoln threw him upon his own resources, and by 
honorable toil and virtuous ambition he pored over the few 
S3anty books in pursuit of knowledge ; and there at the fountain 
of learning, he drank of the waters whose flavor may be found 
infused into so many of the best exhibitions of the genius he 
now possesses. 

It is remarkable in the character of Mr. Lincoln, that with 
the most fervent public spirit and the most generous love of 
country, with talents eminently adapted to the sphere of political 
life, his ambition never seems to have been dazzled with the 
lustre of political renown. 



4 <~> 

lo 

Although often urged to enter upon the theatre of politics, 
and tempted by the most flattering promises both from the pub- 
lic at large and his own particular personal friends, it was with 
no little difficulty that he was prevailed upon to turn aside from 
the path he had marked out for himself. 

Mr. Lincoln, gifted with a gigantic mind, and with a pure and 
honest heart, as honest as the light of day, which he has cultivated 
with an earnest and simple devotion, the refinements of scholar- 
ship and the refinement of moral feeling, until his whole char- 
acter has become one of polished and unspotted transparency. 
Truth with him has a captivation that no imagery can rival, 

and nature has a Deity that his soul adores with a fervent wor- 
ship. 

In the recent presidential canvass his name was submitted to 
the citizens of the IJnited States as a candidate for the chief 
magistracy of the Union. His nomination was made by a con- 
vention of delegates at Chicago from a highly respectable portion 
of our fellow-citizens. As it was unsought for by Mr. Lincoln, 
so was it equally unexpected. 

In his views of the theory of our government, the chief execu- 
tive officer of the republic is a station too august to be made the 
subject of individual solicitation, and, for the same reason, its 
functions are too important to the common welfare to allow a 
patriot citizen to decline them, when the wishes of the people 
invite him to take the public suffrage. This, I understand to be 
Mr. Lincoln's genuine, unaffected sentiment ; and it was, there- 
fore, with him a sense of duty almost invested with the sanctity 
of a religious obligation, that he accepted his nomination. 



14 

From a knowledge of his feelings derived from others, my 
belief is, that when he accepted of the nomination of the Chicago 
Convention, he felt that secret convictions of a painfnl sacrifice of 
comfort and tranquility which every good man feels when con- 
strained by the call of patriotism to devote his mind, his fortune 
or his life, in arduous achievement for his country's good. And 
as it was in this spirit he accepted the nomination, so he did, in 
the same spirit await the issue of that trial, which was one of the 
greatest political struggles for the presidential office that was ever 
known in the history of our Republic. Xever did patriot of any 
country, give himself to his country with a purer heart than did 
Abram Lincoln. The verdict of his countrymen rendered at the 
ballot-box has confirmed it. 

It is grateful, in these days of much excitement, to contemplate 
the character of such a man, who has been chosen to be their 
chief ruler ; in these days, when bitter experience has instructed 
us to distrust all who hold the high, exalted seats of power ; when 
the poisoned politician has thrown the taint of a general sus- 
picion over all who bear the appellation of public servants ; 
when the frequent treachery of the successful demagogue has too 
often taught us to treat as mockery the progressions of patriot- 
ism, and when the boasted virtue, which our forefathers pro- 
nounced vital to republicanism, has almost become a mere name 
' of delusion,— it is a pleasant thing to cast our thoughts upon 
the renowned character of a man which has ever encircled 
his career. 

It teaches us that the the love of homely and old-fashioned 
worth is not obliterated from the hearts of our countrymen, and 



15 

that iu the great multitude of our people there is yet a solid mass 
of right-thinking and plain-dealing men. To that firm phalanx 
of patriots, in these our days of extremest peril, should disaster 
fall upon our luxuriant and proud over-arehing shelter of liberty, 
we may appeal. ! that our country may be saved as the 
chosen land — the last retreat of freedom — the asylum of the 
poor and the opprest of every clime. 



s^ 



\ 



-N 



LB S 12 



